Maruti Suzuki plans to stop selling diesel cars from next year

Maruti Suzuki India Ltd, India's largest carmaker, will stop selling diesel cars from April 2020, once Bharat Stage VI emission norms kick in, as it forecasted a growth rate of 4-8% for the current fiscal.

"From April 1, we will have no diesel car on sale. Depending on how customers react... if we find there is a market for diesel cars (after the new emission norms kick in) we will develop it in a reasonable amount of time," company's chairman R C Bhargava said after announcing the financial results.

About 23% of the company's sales come from diesel cars. It sold 463,000 diesel units last fiscal.

The high cost of upgrading existing diesel engines to the BS VI norms will not make it a viable option for consumers, he said. Bhargava said it won't be possible to make diesel cars below 1,500cc.

"The only area which looks in our range of products possible is somewhere around 1,500cc engine. So if we come back in diesel it will be that range and not lower than that because the price difference factor will make that model unaffordable," Bhargava said.

Over the last few years, there is hardly any price difference between petrol and diesel fuel rates. So, the cost advantage of buying a diesel car has anyways come down.

Maruti's Vitara Brezza and S-Cross have only diesel option. Others like Swift, Baleno, Dzire, Ciaz and Ertiga have both petrol and diesel variants. It recently launched its mid-sized sedan Ciaz with in-house developed BS IV compliant 1,500 cc diesel engine, which can be upgraded to B VI later. All its other cars are powered by 1.3-litre diesel engine sourced from Fiat.

The company will also discontinue its light commercial vehicle (LCV) Super Carry from next year. It would be only available in petrol/CNG version going ahead.

For a BS VI diesel LCV with a small engine, the cost of upgrading will be too high which is why we will discontinue the diesel version from next year. But we will have both petrol and CNG versions of LCV, and we believe these will become more economical for users, he said.

"In Europe, ever since the BS VI has come, there has been a de-growth because the price difference between petrol and diesel has become much bigger. I don't think the Indian market would be any different, here the buyers are even more price conscious," he said.

The current year is the best period to buy diesel cars as from next year such models are going to get much costlier. The company will upgrade all its 16 models and their variants before March 31, 2020. "We have already brought in Alto 800 with BS VI-compliant engine. This process is going to go on throughout this year," Bhargava said. It has already launched BS-VI Alto and Baleno.

EMISSION HIT

• The high cost of upgrading existing diesel engines to the BS VI norms will not make it a viable option for consumers
   
• About 23% of the company's sales come from diesel cars. It sold 463,000 diesel units last fiscal